Grave Consequences

A marine shows the general what he dislikes about the war but his account is buried by the bureaucrats.

I received the WARNORD or warning order at four o’clock in the morning at the darkest time before the dawn.  I was to be ready at the chopper to fly a VIP over the jungle so that he could gain a first-hand apprehension of what was happening in this mixed up war.  I had no idea who my passenger would be, but I had ferried nearly all kinds of gawkers from senators and congressmen to the brass of all services, both generals and admirals.  Usually I tooled out along the routes I knew were not hot, and I kept the VIP in the air until he tapped me on the shoulder and asked me to return to the semblance of civilization where cool shelter and ice cold drinks could allay the stifling, moist heat and brain-numbing sameness of all the green jungle.  I suspected my passengers learned nothing from my tour, but my job was to follow orders.  My third tour of duty was ending in another three weeks of this god forsaken country.  I just wanted to finish out my time and get back home.

          “Marine, here are your orders.  Remember, take no risks.  Fly the man out and around and get him back here as soon as you can without rushing him.  Your passenger will be wearing four stars today, and he’ll be relieving the sorry b*****d who’s been running the show till now.  Keep your thoughts to yourself and just nod and smile.  You know the drill.  Don’t be a hero.”

          So, I thought, I was going to fly the big man himself.  All I had to do was say, “Yes, sir! Yes, sir! Three bags full.”  Then it would be over, and I could go back to counting the minutes until this Hell was over.  If only things were that simple!  I had to admit that flying the general safely above the conflict was better than getting my a*s shot off for a fourth time in three tours.  My normal Marine Recon work was like that�"dangerous and dirty, but this dog-and-pony duty, which was in stark contrast to living on my belly in the jungle with bullets coming at me from all directions, grated on my nerves like the shrapnel I still carried in my arm, my leg and my back. 

          I checked the Huey by the book and hoped that Mr. Murphy was not aboard this morning.  At five o’clock I started the rotors working just to warm her up so that when the general came at five-fifteen, we could take off immediately.  You don’t keep a four star waiting for even a second. 

His jeep pulled up right on the dot, and he ducked towards the opening as if he had done this kind of thing before.  When he was seated and belted in, he gestured for me to get on with it.  I saluted and took the helo up and out.  The first light was breaking as we cleared the camp boundary, and we were over broad farmlands and then to the west we found the canopy as I rose high enough above to be reasonably safe from ground fire. 

          The general took in the view, and then he turned to me and asked, “Will we be seeing anything besides all this greenery?”

          “General, sir, if you mean the war, we’ll not be seeing any fighting on our route.  Everything having to do with the war is happening below the canopy and underground.”

          The general nodded and asked, “Marine, how many tours have you done?”

          “General, this is my third tour, sir, and my last.  Twenty more days, four hours and thirty minutes, and then I’m going stateside.”

          “Tell me, Marine, what’s it like to have fought through three tours?”

          “Sir, I do my duty, and at the end of every day I say, ‘Thank God, I’ve lived another day.’”

          “And what do you think of this war?”

          “Sir, war is Hell, and this war is a travesty.”

          “Marine, I misheard you.  What did you say?  The noise is affecting my ears.”

          “Sir, I said, ‘war is Hell,’ sir, general, sir.”

          “Marine, we all know war is Hell, but can you be specific?”

          “General, we go into the jungle and stay within our sector, and we get shot and some don’t make it and others get medevacked.  The rules are all against us, yet we do our duty.”

          “What rule would you change if you were in my place?”

          “General, sir, I would not presume to tell the general what to do.  I do my duty and hope to get through the day.”

          “Marine, I am ordering you to tell me what you’d change.”

          “Yes, general, sir.  How much time do you have, sir, before we fly back to the base?”

          “Marine, I am here to discover the truth about this war, and if you can show me a glimpse of that truth, I have as much time as that will take.  So what do you estimate it will take?”

          “Sir, it will take an hour, give or take, to fly out and the same time to fly back.  We’ll be flying off our planned route.”

          “Marine, proceed.  I take the responsibility for your change of route.”

          “Yes, sir.  I am vectoring to course two seven zero now, sir.”

          “That will take us due west over the border?”

          “Yes, sir, only just.  You asked, sir, and you shall have one look that will be worth a thousand newspaper stories or a dozen intelligence reports.”

          “All the jungle, and you know exactly where to take me?”

          “Yes, sir.  We all know where it is.  Keep your eyes trained to twelve o’clock, sir, and you’ll see it in twenty minutes.”

          “Marine, while we’re flying out, give me your impression of what it’s been like to fight through three tours.”

          “General, sir, the soldiers are bored sick and tired.  Corruption and crime are everywhere.  No one knows why we are here.  We call volunteers the heroes because they will soon be dead.  Only the dead will know the end of this war.  I wear shrapnel under my skin that pains me every minute.  I have nightmares about what I should have done and the lives I might have saved.  Medals can’t compensate for what I’ve been through.”

          “You volunteered?”

          “General, not exactly, sir.  I was drafted, and when the Marines came through the lines of draftees, they pointed at me and said I’d be a Marine.  So I was volunteered, sir, along with troops with rap sheets so long, they asked for extra paper to list all their crimes and punishments.”

          “And you became Marine Recon.”

          “Yes, sir.  At training, I learned not to ask questions and never to volunteer.”

          “Yet you drew the toughest duty of any serving here.  My hat is off to you.”

          “Thank you, sir, but I don’t deserve your regard.  I just want to do my duty and go home.  Look ahead now, sir, and you’ll see a small clearing in the Jungle with a trail leading into the clearing from the north and continuing to the south below it.”

          “And is that Laos?”

          “General, yes, sir, it is.”

          “And is that some sort of supply depot in the clearing?”

          ‘Yes, sir, it is.  Munitions.  Supplies.  Weapons.  Everything that keeps the war going on this side of the border.”

          “Good Lord, and you said that everyone knows about this?”

          “Yes, General, sir.  Everyone knows.  I’m going to make a pass so you can take a little closer look, but if we’re spotted, we won’t be shot.”

          “And why is that, Marine?”

          “General, sir, that’s because for both sides this is just a game whose rules are clear and longstanding.  We let the resupply route remain open, and they return the compliment by not firing at such as we.”

          “Have you flown anyone else over this clearing?”

          “No, general, sir, I have not.  Take a close look because we shouldn’t get closer than we are right now.  I’m going to reverse course so you can continue to inspect the supplies.  Now we’re going back across the border.”

          “Marine, you tell me that everyone knows about this?”

          “Yes, general, sir, everyone knows.  Not everyone has seen what you now have seen, sir, but they know.”

          “Why don’t we just bomb this location and any other that they try to mount to replace it?”

          “General, sir, I just don’t know.  That’s way above my pay grade.  I just do my job.”

          “And, Marine, have you fought across the border in Laos?”

          “General, sir, if I had fought across the border, I would not be at liberty to say so.  That kind of action would be illegal as well as against the rules of engagement.  Our very flight path�"the one we just have taken�"is against the rules.  I could not say that we ever saw the clearing or what we saw in it.”

          “Marine, this is insane!”

          “General, sir, if you say so, sir.”

          “So, Marine, the rules are constructed in such a way that we cannot interdict the supplies of the enemy even though we know precisely where they are? And you’re telling me that my predecessor knew this and did nothing?”

          “General, sir, that’s not for me to say.  I’ve shown you what you asked to see.  That much was my duty.”

          “Marine, thank you for showing me the truth.”

          “General, you are most welcome, sir.  If the general doesn’t mind, I’d like to radio our current position and our ETA to base.”

          “Very well, Marine, do so.”

          So I radioed our grid position, our intended movement and ETA.  From the tone of the response, I could tell that the general’s staff was not happy about the extra time we had taken for his tour.  When we landed two hours late, the General ducked out of the Huey and hunched over as he made his way to his saluting subordinates.  When he was clear of the rotors, he turned and, to my astonishment, he saluted me.  I returned his salute, but he was already turning to go and his staff closed in behind him.

          That evening, I received a visit from my commanding officer, who was not a happy camper.  He told me that the general had called a press conference at which he described in vivid detail everything I had told him, our itinerary and what he saw in the clearing.  The press was clamoring for details, which the general might have given except that the general’s staff interrupted the questioning and said they would put out a statement later in the day to clarify what the general had said. 

          “Marine, stand to attention.  I’m going to see that you are busted back as far as the UCMJ will allow.  If you weren’t so short, I’d order you put under arrest and held in the stockade on bread and water rations.  What possessed you to take the general off the prescribed route? Don’t try to tell me that he ordered you to do that because I’m not going to hear it.  You have taken our new commanding officer to see what he never should have been permitted to see.   You knew exactly what you were doing.  Now there’s going to be Hell to pay.  What do you have to say for yourself?”

          “Sir, no excuse, sir.”

          The newspapers never printed what the general said he had seen.  Instead they printed excerpts from the pabulum that the general’s staff had prepared as the four-star general’s official statement.  As for me, I was sent out on recon patrols for the next two weeks.  My commanding officer clearly wanted me not to return alive, but I survived the ordeals and returned to base in time to pack my gear and to make my passage back to the States.  Of all the experiences I had in Vietnam, the general’s flight was clearly the sum total of the war as I saw it.